“It was really slippery and tricky for us out there, but I have a really good feeling with the car and the pace has been good. The more time I have behind the wheel, the better it’s getting. I don’t have to think so much about the driving any more, it just works.

“The most difficult thing from this morning was that although the surface looks similar from one corner to the next, the grip level is changing all the time. It’s really tricky to find a consistent rhythm.

“Now, we just need to continue with the good job we’ve done so far – continue to match the pace of the Volkswagens and stay in the fight.” ADDITIONAL M-SPORT DRIVERS

Ott Tänak (4th) said:

“The recce was very wet and it was difficult to make the notes – especially as we didn’t do this event last year. We had to make new notes, in the rain, so they were far too slow in places and we have had to make a lot of corrections after this first pass.

“I think we have to be happy with the job we have done this morning. I wasn’t very confident in SS4 but generally I have been really pleased with our times. We are here, and everything is working really well at the moment.”

Henning Solberg (8th) said:

“I think this could be quite a good weekend for us. Everything is working well – Ilka’s [Minor, co-driver] working well, the car is working well, and if we can keep out of trouble I think it will be good. We had a puncture on SS3 which set us back a bit. We had to drive eight kilometres with the flat and I can tell you that that was not so easy!”

LUSAIL (Qatar): Nasser Saleh Al-Attiyah cruised through the final six gravel special stages of the Manateq Qatar International Rally to seal a convincing victory on Saturday.

A record-breaking 14th victory in his home event also marked a remarkable 70th MERC victory in the 211-event history of the FIA Middle East Rally Championships since 1984. His French co-driver Matthieu Baumel duly claimed his third win in Qatar and a career 18th in the MERC.

The success also marked the first outright FIA championship rally win for Volkswagen’s Polo GTI R5 that made its debut at the WRC in Spain last October and claimed WRC 2 success in Sweden in February with Norwegian driver Ole Christian Veiby. Customer Polos have already won national events in Belgium, Norway, Sweden and Latvia this year

Hello Friends & fans, thank you deeply I want their daily tracking, by my reports, photos, links of my fanpages work, teams, drivers, videos and everything related to the activity that we love, and unites us in every day, RALLY, especially the WRC. We came together to 11,000 friends who share this passion, and work with me.

I love them dearly, a big hug and go for more. I give this exciting picture of one of my favorite cars, say legendary Subaru Impreza WRC 555 who manned the Rally of Catalonia in Spain 2002, the Norwegian the Viking Petter Solberg and his Welsh navigator Phil Mills beside the historic British company Prodrive, under the financial support from Mitaka in Tokyo in Japan by STI.